Page 62 of Cold as Ice

Mal cleared his throat. “Okay, no, it didn’t meannothing.”

“So I guess the question is . . .do youwantto be a virgin? If you do—”

“I don’t,” Mal said, the words coming out of his mouth before he could consider the implications.

Elliott let out a breath. “Okay. Okay. So we should . . .uh . . .” Suddenly, he looked as nervous as Mal felt.

Of course Elliott didn’t have much experience with virgins. He wasElliott.

“We don’t have to do this,” Malcolm said and leaned down and picked up his bag. “I just . . .I wanted to know why. And I guess I’ve not been struggling on my own. It helps to know that—”

Elliott leaned in and kissed him again. Kissed the words right out of his mouth. His lips were lush and determined on his, and any lust that had been extinguished by the humiliation of admitting the truth to Elliott returned tenfold.

Mal dropped the bag and this time let his hands actually touch. Let his fingertips drift across all that bare, exposed skin. As soft as he’d imagined it looked. But tough too, and strong, and desire roared through him, out of control—if he’d ever wanted to control it to begin with.

Elliott broke the kiss, breathing hard again. “Jesus, if I’d known you could kiss like that . . .”

“What do I kiss like?” Malcolm wasn’t sure. It had beensolong. Only once since Aubrey. When he’d needed to make sure, for himself, that Aubrey hadn’t been turned off or disgusted by the way they’d kissed.

But once that question had been answered, he’d been done.

Hadn’t been tempted, even a little, to do more with the guy.

“Like you’ve been thinking about this as much as I have,” Elliott said. Took a step back. “So are you gonna tell me why? I feel like before we do this, I should know.”

“Why I haven’t had sex?” Malcolm hesitated. If confessing the truth had been embarrassing, this was even worse. “There was a guy in high school. I thought he liked me. He said he liked me. We kissed a few times.” He rubbed his neck, forcing himself to keep looking into Elliott’s green eyes, alive with interest and arousal. “We were going to do more. I agreed to meet him one night, and then I overheard him in the locker room. He was going to stand me up. It was all a big joke.”

“Was it?”

It had been almost impossible to confess this thing. The bedrock of so many of Malcolm’s best and worst habits. And here Ell was, questioning it.

“Of course it fucking was. He said it was,” Mal snapped.

Elliott smiled. “Or else he was just saying that to his friends. High school boys are idiots.”

“You’re barelynota high school boy,” Mal said.

“And I can be an idiot, but I’m not going to be an idiot about this. I promise.” Elliott reached out, took his hand, uncurled each finger, one at a time, until he released his book bag. It fell to the floor, and Elliott pulled him towards the bed in the corner.

The bed that Mal had known was there, of course, but had refused to acknowledge until this moment.

Elliott gently pushed him against it, the backs of his knees hitting the edge of the mattress, and he went down.

He didn’t know whether the heat was lust or embarrassment or anger. Or an intoxicating swirl of all three.

Elliott made him feel all of it. Every single thing, sometimes at the very same time.

“Don’t worry,” Elliott said. “We’ll go slow.”

He didn’t know whatslowmeant. He half expected Elliott to go to his knees and coax his pants off and then coax his cock into his mouth or his hand, and it would be over very, very quickly after that.

But instead, Elliott slotted himself between Mal’s legs and leaned in, kissing him again. His hands curled around Mal’s shoulders, digging into the thick cotton of his sweatshirt.

Mal didn’t have any of that in the way of touching Elliott. He could explore every inch of his shoulders, every muscle that bunched and then released under all that smooth skin. The way his breath caught when Malcolm’s hands curled around his waist, thumbs digging into his abs.

Mal knew he could lose himself in this. It felt so goddamn good to touch someone and let them touch him in return. But at the same time, he knew it wouldn’t have been this good with anyone else. Only someone he’d really, really wanted.

Only Elliott.

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